Hartlepool man’s thumbs up for home treatment scheme

Grateful Edward Alton has praised a health scheme which saved him from a stay in hospital for a painful chest infection.

Instead, the Hartlepool man got the intravenous therapy he needed from the comfort of his own living room.

For two weeks, a rapid response nurse visited twice a day to administer the antibiotic treatment through a catheter into a vein.

Now it’s completed, he gets regular visits from a community nurse to check on his health.

He said: “To be told I could stay at home to have the treatment was a big relief. I think it has helped my recovery.”

Edward has suffered chest pains for years. At its worst, he needed hospital treatment for pneumonia.

In the last year, he was diagnosed with a bacterial lung infection pseudomonas, and has a condition where the airways of the lungs become widened, leading to excess mucus which make the lungs prone to infection.

He said: “All the community nurses who have treated me have been fantastic and have always been there to help me – even if I want to just pick up the phone to ask them a question.”

Community rapid response nurse Katy Ingledew said: “By linking in with hospital staff we are able to create a system where we can visit a patient’s home and carry out this treatment.

“I love being a community nurse, visiting patients in an environment they are far more comfortable in.”

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